Along with three school mums we made our way up to Wembley for the Robbie Williams Take the Crown tour, we had a great night out, I have a post and video to come. What did I think? Over priced drinks (£7.50 for a Pimms), staff shortchanging me wasn’t good, when I pointed it out the lad disappeared ….Robbie, as carismatic as ever but was there really need to belt out your new song ‘Go f*@k yourself’, I may be getting old but once I’d heard that I lost interest I’m afraid. Lots of parents had bought their kids along thinking it would be a family friendly show and at £75 a ticket they forked out big monies. I’m not sure they were so pleased with Rob’s outburst either.

30th June – Sunday

Day spent at the beach with sunshine, they made sandcastles, they went in the sea, they tried out the new dinghy and we took them from the car to their beds so exhausted were they when we arrived home. Beautiful family day.

1st July – Monday

Oh how my heart beat proudly as I pulled Alice’s certificate out of her book bag, of course Bessie wants one now too and has been practising hard all week the tricky words with her dad. Bless her I hope she gets one but if she doesn’t then I’ll tell her maybe next year will be her turn ;)

2nd July – Tuesday

I was invited by UKmumsTV to judge the best toys for Christmas 2013, I took my job very seriously as you can see, I chose my top ten and there are some fabulous gifts on offer this year, really interesting, a post to follow this week with my faves ;)

3rd July – Wednesday

Possibly the only flower pot in the garden doing so well, a couple look very sad but this one is a beauty, just a shame the light that day wasn’t great.

4th July – Thursday

And a dream came true thanks to Argos who contacted me a while back asking me to review a product from their White Goods selection. We have desperately needed a new oven since we moved in so we grabbed the chance. The first thing I cooked was pasta for the girls on the hob (seems a perfect start to me) and secondly frozen fish and chips in the oven on Friday night when Mum and Grandad returned from their two month stint in Sardegna – easy meal. BUT I have a fabulous combi recipe for you which I used whilst waiting for the new one to be plumbed in, sitting on the top are my turkey puffs, recipe to follow.

5th July – Friday

I spent the morning at The Westbury hotel in Londonlooking at the Tesco Christmas in July range and I could have bought a ton of stuff, I am not kidding. Another post to follow, boy am I going to be busy this week! What really caught my eye were the houses made out of Tesco biscuits by the stylists to create such an enchanting effect. The styling was very rustic, homely and totally wowed me, like I said great post to follow but here’s two other ideas that caught my eye, jam jars used to serve lemonade and flowers displayed in a covered tin.

Have a great week all, there should be plenty of sunshine, more Christmas in July and lots of family moments as we wind down at the end of the school year

Lewis is 18 and we put on our party frocks to celebrate him in style. I think I was very lucky to find these pretty girls dresses in Asda, part of a range by fashion graduates – aren’t they fabulous? £8.00 each

Sunday 16th

Father’s day, here’s a beautiful card Alice made at school for her dad which has a xylophone type message inside where she has written ‘This much’

Monday 17th

How cute, a snail or other garden bug has cut hearts in the flowers

Tuesday 18th

We host a new fella, number puppy 9 this week, her tries out daddy’s new fire pit

Wednesday 19th

I am ready for BritMums Live 2013 and M&S have kindly given me a pair of their fabulous Insolia Shoes to try out

Thursday 20th

A daily ritual is crossing out a day on the birthday countdown calendar – they love it and it has stopped the incessant – ‘How many days till…?’ question

Friday 21st BritMums Live

I arrive early and get my photo taken before the masses arrive with the great word cards made to use over the weekend. Epic!

Saturday 22nd

An enormous honour to meet and chat with the very brave Katie Piper, such an inspirational woman

Sunday 23rd

Bessie starts to use her gifts out of the BritMums Live 2013 goody bag

Monday 24th

Chilling after school with a Scooby Doo ice lolly

Tuesday 25th

The girls make a treasure trail using every soft toy we have running from their bedroom upstairs all the way down and through the house to the kitchen = tea time ;)

Wednesday 26th

After school we get out some felt pens and draw what comes to mind. I ask Alice if her picture is an aeroplane ‘No mummy! It’s a train.’ Ooops

Thursday 27th

I’m having a go at photography today and then trying out graphics on top, I like this photo but my brother tidied up the graphics for me

Friday 28th

I made a quiche with four different cheeses and some sliced chorizo, it was so delicious there was none left by Saturday noon. Here you can see Bro’s version against mine. His is visually more pleasing. With mine I was more concerned about people using my images as there own and so tried to make it difficult for them to crop the image. Still work to be done I guess but I have plenty of time before I am a famous photographer ;)

I’m exhausted after a fabulous week and an amazingly tiring day settling in back home, the grass was overgrown, the weeds had overtaken the garden and the washing machines is on non stop.

It all started last Saturday when we set off for Devon and our journey took 8 hours as opposed to the normal 5. We tried to be clever and skip the congested part of the M5 via Bristol – mistake as everyone else had had the same idea!

Then I went to the loo when I got there and managed to lock myself in!! The panic. Nobody would know where I was, I didn’t have my phone with me and …. eventually I managed to unlock the door and unsurprisingly I never used that loo again.

Then I helped hubbie put the awning up and once we had finished the job, totally knackered, I realised we’d put it on inside out and we had to start all over again, needless to say my order at the bar later was a LARGE white wine please which I enjoyed whilst watching Gareth Gates – remember him?

Anyway, the view the following morning made it all worth it, only I woke up with a virus and zero energy!

A capture of the girls enjoying the awning, I love how they both have their legs crossed and I love how they like to play ‘register’ writing down all the names of their class mates and saying who’s having lunch or packed lunch. Priceless. Here they are sharpening their pencils – both ends, it seems to be the latest thing, a double pencil.

Another special treat when we’re on holiday is to paint our nails, Alice chose blue stepping away from her usual pink for the first time ever.

On this holiday we were joined by two of Paul’s brothers and their families and we got together on a few evenings, including the holiday must – Fish and chips from the take away which were delicious. I loved reading the ‘Tasting Notes’ on the bottle of Spitfire Ale, they really made me giggle.

I posted a picture on my Instagram stream and again on Facebook of this new statue in Ilfracombe harbour. I was surprised to see no plaque, no information saying what, who and why. Then Facebook did me proud, Francesca reminded me it had been on the news and the locals didn’t like it. It’s Damien Hirst and her name is Verity. Link goes through to more info – what do you think?

We spent a brilliant day at Watermouth Castle which is a castle (like I needed to tell you) plus a beautiful garden full of rides which the girls loved, we also played mini golf and here’s dad checking out the longest slide.

Then the weather warmed up slightly so we packed our lunches and bags of buckets and spades and made our way to Woolacombe beach, along with every other family in the area it seemed! A massive beach FULL of windbreakers but we also tried our hand at belly boarding which was brilliant fun but the Atlantic proved to icy for me – I’ll wait for warmer climes before I go belly boarding ;)

This week has been a funny old one, the kind of week where nothing went to plan but there were lots of hidden surprises – including the central heating being put back on!!

I’m so glad I’m not in a tent

Saturday 11th May

We decided to take a trip to Birchington where we keep the caravan and book ourselves in for a night. Even if the weather wasn’t going to be good, we needed to check what equipment was on board and that the central heating worked ready for our future trip to Devon. The girls, as always, were extremely pleased – any night in the caravan counts as a holiday for them and we were able to swim in the empty swimming pool and play in the adventure park too.

Sunday 12th May

We woke to blue but very cold skies after a pleasant night. Luckily the caravan kept us all snug and it was a pleasure to wake up and get breakfast ready in it. I started my new Emily Peacock Mexican Tree of Life project and also got the girls a kit to try alongside me – they love it!

Monday 13th May

I was supposed to go to London with the BritMums team and meet Minister Elizabeth Truss but I was feeling so low, I felt as if I’d been run over by a steam roller and spent the day feeling very sorry for myself indeed. However I did capture the rainbow for the girls who wanted to go and find the treasure.

Tuesday 14th May

Sorry no photo – it was a massive catch up day for me!

Wednesday 15th May

Starting to feel a bit better and on collecting the girls from school today I discovered it was our turn to host Jim, Badgers class pet – Jim apparently is a girl. The girls were beside themselves with excitement, they’ve obviously been watching other classmates take him home and were itching to have him. It’s a brilliant idea and it’s to encourage writing skills, so we talked about Jim and decided what he likes to eat and drink and we placed him in the middle of their beds that night to save arguments as they BOTH wanted him!

Thursday 16th May

Jim was taken back to school and I shot up to London to the M&S A/W13 press day. I was very excited and I shall be writing about it over the next week or two as I learnt so much information I couldn’t possibly put it all in one post.

I mentally spent a fortune whilst I was there and I’m definitely shopping there as soon as the products come into stores. Which coat do you like best?

Friday 17th May

In Italy Friday 17th is unlucky – pretty much like we use Friday 13th here and I felt dreadful All Day Long again, this time it’s menses to blame but after a painful day look at the sight that met me before I went to bed. Separate or leave together, that was the question I asked Facebook :)

Well what a week it’s been, another that has flown by in a click of the fingers which reminds me to document that Alice is trying to learn how to click her finger and thumb – I think it may take a while.

Saturday 4th May – Daddy’s birthday weekend and we had his twin and all of the family descending on us for an evening BBQ, what better excuse did daddy need to put a tent up? Mind you I remember as a child loving to play in a tent in the garden, we even slept out there occasionally.

A great time was had by all and we were greeted with this fabulous sunset that was taken with no flash and no touching up after, isn’t it spectacular?

Sunday 5th May – After clearing up and having lunch we decided to take the girls to the beach for a quick spin on their bikes and what a great decision, the tide was out all afternoon and although too cold to swim we had a lovely afternoon down there.

Monday 6th Bank Holiday – Paul had to go to work and I had to catch up on the ironing but I also found time to make the Yeo Valley beef and barley cottage pie which was a hit with everyone only Alice still refuses to eat mash potato which I find so strange, I mean EVERYONE loves mashed potato, right?

Tuesday 7th May – At our school Tuesdays are trainer Tuesdays IF you walk to school, which we do. So here are the girls ready to go to school in about 5 minutes getting in a quick LeapPad game and lounging on the sofa watching Peppa Pig who continues to be a house favourite

Wednesday 8th May – That’s it guys, the summer is over and welcome back to good Ol’ Blighty and her dreadful weather. Take a look at this late evening sky and how moody it is? I used flash on this one which you can see bouncing off the forsynthia but I don’t think it made much difference to the sky above.

Thursday 9th May – I adore tulips at this time of year and as I have one of my teapot jugs used at the wedding I try to keep it filled up with colour to brighten the fireplace, I think you can see it’s time to throw this bunch out but not before one last photo. The difference in light by moving the jug to the window was amazing and really shows well in this photo, I may be learning something after all …

and just because I can, a close up of my faded out of date tulips which I hope you agree still look beautiful, a shot inspired by The Boy and Me when she did similar earlier this year with daffodils

Friday 10th May – TGIF! and I mean that this week, it has been super hectic, the BritMums blog has gone beserk with all the Fresh Voice guest posts coming in but boy there’s some excellent reading on there. I have started to turn down more offers for Mari’s World than take up as I just can’t keep up with it all and prefer to write for us rather than companies at the moment barring the odd paid post that comes my way.

Remember I showed you my brown bread disaster? Well I haven’t had the guts to re-try with brown flour yet but I did have a go at a simple white loaf to check the machine was ok and look at this beauty, isn’t she perfect? Stephanie from I’m counting UFOs has told me to try the Almond and apricot recipe as I’m bound to love it, we’ll see Stef, I’m going to give it a go and let you know.

Tea lover, gin drinker or white wine - not fussy.
Itchy feet person who plans to see the world once the kids are grown up.
Full-time working mum in social media.
Blogger since Jan 2010.
Fuelled by chocolate - again not fussy.
Permanently knackered.